Robert Stein (1950)

Robert Stein (1972)

Robert Stein (2000s)

About Me

editor, publisher, media critic and journalism teacher,
is a former Chairman of the American Society of Magazine Editors, and author of “Media Power: Who Is Shaping Your Picture of the World?” Before the war in Iraq, he wrote in The New York Times: “I see a generation gap in the debate over going to war in Iraq. Those of us who fought in World War II know there was no instant or easy glory in being part of 'The Greatest Generation,' just as we knew in the 1990s that stock-market booms don’t last forever.
We don’t have all the answers, but we want to spare our children and grandchildren from being slaughtered by politicians with a video-game mentality."
This is not meant to extol geezer wisdom but suggest that, even in our age of 24/7 hot flashes, something can be said for perspective.
The Web is a wide space for spreading news, but it can also be a deep well of collective memory to help us understand today’s world. In olden days, tribes kept village elders around to remind them with which foot to begin the ritual dance. Start the music.

Monday, October 08, 2012

October Surprise: Bill Replaces Hillary

If he
can persuade Bill Clinton to be Secretary of State in his second term and
announce it, Barack Obama would serve the nation, improve his reelection chances, give the Senate Tea Party a confirmation headache and open a new
chapter in the nation’s most engrossing psycho-political family drama.

Let’s
take a deep breath to parse the multiple meanings of “if.”

Hillary
Clinton has made it clear she will resign after four years of success. No one
mentioned so far, certainly not John Kerry, has the stature to take her place.

Bill
Clinton does. As the most popular figure in American politics, he is doing what he can to help Obama’s reelection. But with a debate debacle now clouding the prospects,
every assurance that the nation would be in good hands during a second term is
needed. The Comeback Kid could signal that by putting his body where his mouth
is.

A
Secretary of State Bill Clinton would be under no pressure to follow the 24/7
traveling tenure of his wife. Over time, the Grey Eminence model in that post
has served the nation well, and a former President could have world leaders
coming to court him, leaving the heavy lifting of constant coming and going to
top assistants.

Senate
confirmation hearing could sell more tickets than the Jon Stewart-Bill O’Reilly debate to see Mitch McConnell and his Tea Party cohort twisting themselves into
knots to impugn the appointee’s qualifications.

Beyond
all those benefits for the body politic, a reversal of roles in the Clinton marriage would be irresistibly fascinating. After decades of emerging from her
husband’s shadow, Hillary Clinton could take over the Global Initiative while
readying for a 2016 run at the White House. His cabinet service would help
prepare him for the role of First Gentleman.

In
the interests of full disclosure, I should reveal my last big proposal for a
presidential campaign in 1952 when, as a voluntary speech writer for Adlai
Stevenson, I suggested that Eisenhower might end the military draft as an
October surprise.

Two
days later, Stevenson called for discontinuing it and was pounded by
Republicans as being soft on defense. Ike won the election and ended the draft.
But that’s politics, isn’t it?